by Leo Carew
The earl ploughed after them and Aramilla followed, her right hand running over the moss-covered stone as she climbed the stairs. Only one thing could have caused all this, but still she doubted it. It did not seem credible. Not even with that growing and dreadful growl from beyond the walls, which had resolved into a fathomless incantation; a horrid hybrid of song and chant.
As she topped the wall, she could at last see over the battlements and onto the fields surrounding the city, and she staggered back as though struck by an arrow.
Beneath her, just out of bowshot from the wall, a metallic noose had encircled the city. It stretched as far as she could see: ranks of armoured men, glinting in the sun’s last rays. Suspended above was a cloud of ragged banners in forms grotesque and alien, bouncing and swaying in step. It was as though an armoured hand had stretched forth from the wilds, reaching out to grasp the city. There came a blare of trumpets, the sound filthy and corrupted compared to the clean howl of brass.
And reverberating around her was that incantation, growling through the very stonework of the city. It was like ringing in her ears, or the roar of blood, or a cold sweat. It spoke the primal language of the body: that of a wolf’s growl, a whale’s cry and a lightning crack. She had to turn away, holding her hands over her ears. She was not alone. Many of the soldiers around her had done the same or clutched onto each other as this Anakim battle-hymn reached a crescendo.
Earl Seaton was staring dumbfounded at this besieging army, his mouth agape. Aramilla darted to him. “You said they were miles north, starving at Deorceaster!”
“They were.” He could not drag his eyes away from the prowling figures below. “They were.”
The Anakim had come to Lundenceaster.
They were trapped.
Part III
LUNDENCEASTER
34
The Smell of Blood
“They’re enormous.”
“Bigger than I remembered,” agreed Gray.
“I didn’t know Sutherners could build such things.”
Roper had heard much about Lundenceaster’s fearsome walls, but still could not believe what he saw before him. They were immense, the lower half covered in a layer of green moss like felt, and for the first time Roper understood why there had been such trepidation at coming here. Almost as bad as the walls was the knowledge that the best of Earl Seaton’s army had retreated here to reinforce the garrison. The vast majority of Suthdal’s forces were now concentrated in Lundenceaster, guarded by the fiercest walls in Albion, save those around the Hindrunn.
At least we’re all here, thought Roper. At least, one way or another, it’s nearly over. At last, the legions, and all his enemies had arrived at the same place. If they could take the city, they would destroy Suthdal’s king, her capital and her army. If they could take the city, Suthdal would succumb to them. Out loud, he said: “So how do we get inside?”
“Well usually you’d starve them out,” said Gray.
“I have no doubt all the food that was absent from our march has already been drawn into the city. We will starve long before they do. Not only do we need to get over the walls, we need to get over them fast. Otherwise we’re done for.”
“I’ve tried ladders here before,” said Gray. “It was a disaster. Climbing so high, with men above and a drop below, you are almost defeated before you have reached the defenders. We used a ram, too, which made no impression on the gates whatsoever. With our men as they are, ladders and rams are impossible.”
“Quite. So what else can we do?”
“We should consult the Historian. She may have a few precedents for us.”
Together, Roper and Gray went to seek out the Battle Historian. Hers was one of the most senior positions within the Academy, beneath only the Chief Historian, her deputy, and the Deep Historians. Instead of being devoted to a particular time-period, as most of the others were, her job was to study war of every kind.
She listened to Roper and Gray’s requirements with interest. “Siege weapons might be fastest,” she said. The last of the day was fading, leaving the walls just a blotch in the dark, which they examined together. “Of which trebuchets are by far the simplest. The disadvantage of that, though, is that once you have created a breach in the walls, the defenders know exactly where you will attack. A breach, if the enemy has time to prepare, can be even bloodier than ladders.”
“We won’t survive that,” said Roper. “Anything else?”
She considered for a while. “Sapping has been used before, at such times,” she noted. “Though it takes time.”
“I’ve never seen it done,” said Gray. “What is the process?”
“You dig trenches, as usual, around the walls,” said the Historian. “It looks as though you are just preparing for a siege, but in one of them, you begin a tunnel that runs towards the wall, aiming usually for a corner or a tower. When you are beneath the wall, you undermine it, removing the foundations and replacing them with wooden stakes. When the walls are left standing on nothing but the stakes, a fire is set, which burns away the supports and makes the wall collapse. If you’re ready to attack when that happens, you can rush the breach and outflank the defences altogether.”
There was a pause as Roper and Gray considered this. “It sounds excellent,” said Roper. “Though it is at the borderline of what we have time for. Our supplies might just see us through. We would have to start straight away.”
“That would be wise,” agreed the Historian.
“And what of the Unhieru, lord?” asked Gray. “Shall we wait for them, for the assault?”
Roper shrugged. “If they are here by the time we’ve finished the tunnel, then we shall use them. But we can wait no longer. We have to take this city before starvation takes us.”
“And still no word from Tekoa?”
Roper was silent for a while, remembering the forest of shivering falcon wings that they had passed on the march. Gray knew nothing of what they had found, and nor did the rest of the army. It was between Roper, Pryce, and the messenger they had sworn to secrecy. “Nothing,” he said, very quietly.
But one of the Skiritai reappeared later that night. Roper could not sleep, kept awake by his rotten heart, and so, by chance, was standing with a sentry, talking quietly and staring out into the star-pricked darkness. “I see lights, lord,” said the sentry, suddenly. They stood on a hill at the camp perimeter, and on the field spread below them, three ghostly lights flickered nearer. “Do you see?”
“I see,” said Roper. Whoever carried them, they did not mind being seen, and the torches quickly grew larger and brighter. Roper realised from their movement that they must be held by men on horseback, and rested a hand on Cold-Edge. “I think they’re Sutherners,” he said softly. “Prepare your bow.”
The sentry nocked an arrow to his bowstring, shouting out a challenge as the horses entered the light of the brazier. They were Sutherners: armoured in the Anakim-bone plates, worn by Bellamus’s Hermit-Crabs. The sentry drew his bow, and the Hermit-Crabs came to a halt, looking on with shadowed faces.
“Are you here to talk?” Roper asked, calmly.
For answer, one of the riders ejected something from his horse, which hit the ground with a heavy thump. Then they turned around and galloped back into the night, taking their fiery torches with them. The object that they had hurled to the ground rested full-length before sentry and Black Lord.
Roper began to move towards it, but unexpectedly the shape coughed. He froze, throwing out a hand to hold back the sentry. Laboured breathing was coming from the dark, and then the shape groaned softly. “Who’s there?” Roper asked of the shape.
It made no reply beyond another disintegrating cough. “He needs help,” said the sentry, starting forward, but Roper gripped his shoulder.
“No. Do not go near that man.”
The two of them listened as the rasping grew heavier and heavier. Whatever this figure was, Roper had the impression it was gathering strength for something. An
d then, two words were choked from the dark. “Stay… back.” The laboured rasping went on a few breaths more, followed by a final word, barely distinguishable, which chilled Roper to his marrow. “Plague.”
Roper tapped the sentry’s arm. “Give me your bow.” It was handed over in silence. Roper drew the string, aiming briefly for the source of the rasping. When he released, the arrow whipped into the dark. There was a brief splutter, a few heartbeats of choking, and then silence. Roper handed the bow back to the sentry. “We cannot let that infection back into the army,” he said.
“So what do we do with the body?”
“Find some oil. Cover your face. Douse the corpse and burn it.” Evidently the Hermit-Crabs had not disbanded, and were commanded by someone in Bellamus’s absence. Roper could not imagine where they had found an infected Skiritai, but where there was one, there had surely been others. “We need bowmen on the perimeter this night. I doubt this will be the only time this happens.”
Roper was right. He strode back into camp to spread word of what they had seen, only to find three messengers converging on him at once, each with a similar tale of sick Skiritai being dumped at the perimeter. “Distribute bowmen around the camp,” Roper decreed. “No watchwords tonight. Kill anyone who tries to come near.”
It transpired that in one case, a sentry had handled the infected Skiritai before realising his mistake. He was now apparently waiting at the edge of camp for Roper’s decision on what was to be done with him. “Take me to him,” said Roper. He was led half an hour across the fire-lit camp, thinking all the while what he would do with this man when he arrived. He insisted on a small detour to his own hearth, where he collected his bow and half a dozen arrows. When they reached the sentry, Roper found him hovering near the infected Skiritai body, ten yards clear of the brazier that was his post. Roper stopped at the brazier, staring out at the sentry. “I’m sorry this lot has fallen to you, my friend,” he said.
“A bad night, lord,” the sentry replied. There came a sudden snoring rasp from the infected Skiritai, lying a few feet from him.
“He’s still alive?” Roper asked.
“Yes, lord.”
Roper was silent, looking into the flames of the brazier. “Do you love your peers?” he asked eventually, looking back at the sentry.
“Yes, lord.”
“You love your home? Your family?”
“I do, lord.”
Roper nodded, staring at him. “So you know what you have to do?”
The sentry replied in a rush. “As the Skiritai did, lord. Leave.”
“Yes, I am afraid that is what you must do,” Roper agreed. “But… don’t let yourself become like him,” he added, indicating the snoring Skiritai. “Don’t let them use you against your loved ones. Will you promise me that?”
“They’ll not take me alive, my lord,” came the voice from the dark.
“You are a good man. Godspeed. I hope you come back to us some day.”
The sentry bowed deeply to Roper. “Until then, my lord.”
Roper smiled, and the sentry smiled back before turning away into the dark. He was singing softly under his breath as he faded into the night. Roper waited until he was out of sight, and then fitted an arrow to his bowstring. Relieved that he was not going to use it on the sentry, he turned it on the dying Skiritai. It took a second arrow before he was quiet. Roper turned to the messenger who had brought him to this place. “Make sure you cover your face when you burn the body,” he said. “Don’t touch it.”
Dawn found the legions stripped to their labouring fatigues and dividing their time between digging, and muttering about the infected Skiritai of the night before. It did not take long to excavate huge trenches around the city; banked earth piled behind them, and sharpened stakes thick in front. All this was visible to the anxious defenders looking out from the walls. Invisible to them was the tunnel, begun in the base of the eastern trench, and reaching out towards the city walls like the roots of a destructive fungus. It was only appropriate, Roper thought, that they would undermine the walls from the east. In Anakim religion, that was the direction of the apocalypse, and it seemed fitting that the Sutherners should know a similar dread when they looked to the rising sun.
Roper joined his men digging in the tunnel, spending a cramped and exhausting morning in increasing dark before he emerged, filthy and squinting, into the daylight. There was news: more infected Skiritai had been left near the rivers and brooks that were being used for water. “Shoot them,” said Roper, bleakly. “There’s nothing we can do for those men, and if that sickness gets back into the army it will be the death of us all.” Privately, he thought it would be a miracle if one of their number did not contract the illness. He walked the camp, finding himself terribly distracted by each cough, each sneeze, each man who looked a little pale. But there was no shortage of pale, exhausted men.
Vigtyr had been excused from digging so that he would be ready to train with Roper that afternoon, and when the two finally clashed, something had changed between them. Vigtyr was more hesitant, Roper emboldened, and able to find that silence so much more easily than before. Though Vigtyr still won more often than not, on three occasions Roper struck him a blow that might have been fatal with a real sword.
Roper had not suddenly surpassed his opponent’s skill with the blade. Though he was improving rapidly, the biggest change was between them. They were growing used to each other’s style and somehow, it was Roper who was developing a mental edge. He watched Vigtyr grow at turns angry and fearful before him, and though it was a piteous sight, he could not help the compelling pleasure that began to overtake him. That of overwhelming something previously feared, and of having taken on a challenge and found himself up to the task.
But there was also the thrill of something a little more disturbing, which translated less well into words, yet familiar to Roper from his experiences as a hunter. Whatever this feeling was, it came from the wild side of Roper’s character, untouched by the discipline insisted on by the Black Kingdom. Lacking words with which to describe it, Roper settled on another sensation to liken it to.
It was the smell of blood.
35
The Tunnel
The Anakim had been outside the city for more than a week. At first, the streets had been deserted, but it was not long before that threat had been partially forgotten, and business had resumed as best as possible. The granaries were full to bursting and there was a general opinion that the Anakim could not get through the walls. The barbarians did not know how, and hunger would finish them before the city was in real danger.
No, the real danger was within the city itself, because King Osbert had lost his mind.
Aramilla and her father had gone to the king with news of what they had seen beyond the city walls, and the response had been disturbing.
They knelt before His Majesty, backstage at the playhouse, and surrounded by the smell of fresh paint and sawn wood. The king, still dressed in his shining armour from the stage, seemed barely to hear their words. He looked down at his feet, and then began rummaging through a pile of props, selecting a bow and contentedly testing its flex.
Earl Seaton and Aramilla exchanged a glance. “Your Majesty?” enquired Earl Seaton. “Majesty, have you heard what I have said?”
King Osbert still did not reply, but his head began to shake as he examined the bow in his hands. An involuntary exclamation escaped his lips, almost a moan. Still, he said nothing.
Earl Seaton elbowed Aramilla, and she opened her mouth. “Majesty,” she said gently.
“Oh! She speaks!” King Osbert looked up suddenly at Aramilla, his face crimson and quivering. “You dare? You dare at this time!” He dropped the bow and pointed a shaking finger at her. “She who conspires against me, she who drew them here! Admit it, confess! You are with them!”
This accusation was so absurd that Aramilla saw no need to defend herself. She almost laughed. But her father evidently did not agree. He stood suddenly,
seized her arm, and dragged her from the chamber. Stumbling back, Aramilla was followed by the deranged king’s howls of “Treachery! Treachery!”
“Do not go near him,” snapped the earl, eventually releasing Aramilla in a corridor, his advice never needed less.
Aramilla had spent the days since spent mostly shut inside one of her father’s halls, half-expecting to be arrested. The king was always at his most fearful at night, and each morning that she awoke in her own bed, free from the grip of royal guards, seemed too good to last. She reasoned that the king’s disintegration was too complete for him to bother with her. There had been rumours that he was equal to no more than sitting silently on his throne, banishing all servants and slowly wasting away. But she could not convince herself. As surely as leaves fall in autumn, the king would rouse himself, and Aramilla would find herself rounded up for a sham trial, ending in a public decapitation.
Occasionally she thought of escape, but that seemed as plausible as the hope that the Anakim might just have come to see King Osbert’s play.
On the eleventh morning of the siege, Aramilla awoke to a sense that something had changed. Her door creaked as a maid entered the room, wordlessly setting and lighting a fire in the hearth before departing. Aramilla ignored her, lying draped in light silks, listening to the sounds of the household stirring. Someone was scolding a servant for carelessness on the floor below. Another pattered down the corridor outside her chamber, carrying something heavy from the weight of their tread. All sounded as it should, but still there was that sense of change. She turned over and at once, her eye stumbled over something new.